Our invention relates to a timekeeping system to record, calculate and display employee and job information in an establishment having a number of employees and having a number of different types of operations engaged in by the employees.
The system is especially useful in a shop having a number of mechanic employees and having a number of different types of machines operated by those employees.
In many industrial and business operations, management doesn't know the cost of various jobs in terms of workers' time and other costs. From the viewpoint of many workers, such as the craftsmen in machine shops, getting the job done is the first priority. Paperwork is viewed as management's responsibility. The workers first may not like record keeping. However, in many businesses and industrial operations, such as a contract machine shop where profit is made on labor, not necessarily on materials, an accurate accounting of time spent on each of the many jobs in progress is essential. Since the price of a job in such contract shop is usually fixed before the job is started, accurate record keeping won't help make a profit on that job, but good records will indicate if the job should be run again for the same price. Sound records also help provide estimators with more accurate information, for future estimates, as to what machines were used, who operated them and how long it took. If an identical job is run at a later date, an exact price can be determined in advance. In different jobs, estimates for contract quoting are improved. Determining which jobs are profitable and which are not is understandably important. Most contract shops would show a larger profit at the end of the year by doing twenty percent less work--if they knew which jobs not to do.
Keeping track of who spent how much time on which job is the most difficult part of determining the ultimate profitabilities of jobs. It seems simple until there are, for example, thirty-five employees working on sixty-five different jobs, each of which have multiple operations. Each operation is done as the equipment needed becomes available, creating a series of delays which make accurate record keeping difficult. If the record keeping system in use is complicated, cumbersome, or inconvenient, in most cases the employees will not use it consistently or will avoid it all together, making accurate cost figures virtually impossible to obtain.
The objectives of our invention, therefore, include: providing a time-keeping system for keeping of such records that is easy to use, that provides information of such accuracy as is needed (which could vary from rough information to more exact accounting) that is economical to procure; and providing additional desirable features in a time keeping system such as restricting information depending on the person operating a terminal or which terminal is used, such as having the capability to respond as to the status of any job at any time, such as doing normal daily timekeeping with the same system for payroll purposes, such as checking attendance, and such as sounding rest and lunch breaks and also accounting for the times involved, which normally would not be charged to the jobs.
Our invention will be best understood, together with additional advantages and objectives thereof, when read with reference to the drawings.